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February 25, 2013

BEST PICTURES: Oscar Weekend Art Openings in L.A.

By.
t.s.

The Oscars may have gotten top billing this weekend in Los Angeles, but with the throng of art openings that also took place around the city, there were plenty of other "best pictures" worth checking out. Below, (not) straight from the Academy, are the winners of this year's first annual Painting In L.A. Oscar Weekend Gallery Opening Awards. Or the PILAOWGOA's for short.

This show was a shoe in to win as soon as the actual best supporting actor nominee Tommy Lee Jones showed up at the opening. Prince's cowboy themed paintings were nice but it was so packed on opening night that getting a good look at them proved challenging. Instead, the main attraction ended up being the star-studded crowd itself. We aren't going to name names lest we tarnish our reputation as a serious, intellectually rigorous art publication. We will, however, post a picture.

Richard Prince, Cowboys, opening night at Gagosian Gallery. Several of those heads are super famous, promise.

Our top award goes to the very talented Allison Schulnik who definitely knows how to craft a memorable picture. The basement gallery at the Laguna Art Museum is a perfect setting for Schulnik's lightly menacing graveyard-inspired paintings. Three of her animated films, Hobo Clown (2008), Forest (2009), and Mound (2011) are also being screened in an adjacent room. The soundtrack from the films, made up of Grizzly Bear songs, can be heard softly throughout the entire exhibit, adding nicely to the atmosphere of the show.

Henry Taylor ran away with this one, turning Blum & Poe's main gallery space into a "formal" dining room complete with a crystal chandelier and a groomed dirt floor. But despite the theatrics, Taylor's large paintings still managed to steal the show.

If you had a rag with you at Karen Wood's show this weekend, you might have been tempted to wipe the water droplets from her small, beautiful paintings - they look that real. But Wood's paintings are more than just Tromp l'oeil special effects. They manage to imbue quite, everyday scenes with a weighty importance.

Mara De Luca had the best-dressed paintings on view this weekend. Part of her process involves collaging actual translucent fabric onto the surface of her paintings, visually mimicking the "minimal atmospheric effects of the California Light and Space movement" among other historic modes of abstraction.

Paintings by Mara De Luca in Cruise Collection 2013 at Luis De Jesus Los Angeles